It happened by accident the other day, as I was eating lunch at a local gourmet supermarket.  At the table next to me, a young man about 30 years old, was being interviewed by two middle-aged, female managers.

I overheard enough of the interview to be reminded of how wrong-headed, demoralizing and downright negative many job interviews can be, and remembered not fondly, how many times I sat in the same seat as that young man.

First, the location for the interview was completely wrong: out in the public arena in the sit-down self-service dining area, at a table just inches away from mine and other patrons.

Secondly, I noticed the stress-inducing seriousness of the two women who seemed to bore into this young man with the ferocity and demeanor of interrogators, rather than enlightened employers. Their approach seemed calculated to trip him up, to make him stumble on his own words. They sounded obsessive about details in his resume and application form, in an effort to uncover any discrepancies between the two.

Unfortunately for you students about to graduate and hit the marketplace with whatever skills and talents and strengths you have managed to acquire in your lives, too many job interviews proceed this way.

From my vantage point, it seemed that the young man held his own, was unfazed and maintained a smile and good humor, and it’s certainly possible that later in the interview a more relaxed approach emerged; I tuned-out before that possibility was reached. I did learn that this applicant had already passed a “screening interview” prior to the interview at hand.

All of which contributed to my motivation to shout out to you students about to hit the job application process for summer and/or for life.

And a hypothesis came to mind concerning the continuing riddle of high rates of unemployment despite the partial economic recovery. This question has baffled labor economists now for several years, and though I’m not an economist by trade, I am interested in this very question about jobs.

Is it possible that the arduous and tedious job application process itself is a disincentive to the goal of lowering the unemployment rate, and finding good matches between job-seekers and employers?

For example, the increased layers of inquiry and levels of distrust built into the system, has exploded over the past 30-plus years, while wages, working conditions, benefits and degree of professional autonomy, have remained stagnant, or even declined.

If the job application “game” is a kind of “gotcha” exercise, in which both parties try to outwit the other and in which there is almost never an authentic dialogue between job-seeker and employer, this could certainly be a factor explaining why many people enter the “long-term unemployed” or “discouraged worker” column – a column which is not counted in official unemployment statistics.

So what’s the alternative?

Though no one should expect a “Kumbaya” song circle to define the application process, employers should consider the advice of enlightened management consultants, including for example, the experts from The Gallup Organization (yes, the same company that does political polling).

Gallup published an illuminating book, “Now, Discover Your Strengths,” by Marcus Buckingham and Donald Clifton in 2001, which advocated a “strengths revolution” in the workplace.

The essential message of the revolution was to turn assumptions about the employer-employee relationship on its head from the traditional formulas that have been part of “conventional management wisdom” for a long time.

“Conventional management wisdom” has long held that the most essential thing a manager needs to do to train his employees, is correct their deficits. They do this, according to Buckingham and Clifton, because they operate from two flawed assumptions about human nature:

“Each person can learn to be competent in almost anything. Each person’s greatest room for growth is in his or her areas of greatest weakness.”

In contrast to this “conventional management wisdom” these “strengths revolution” advocates assert two opposite assumptions about human nature:

“Each person’s talents are enduring and unique. Each person’s greatest room for growth is in the areas of his or her greatest strength.”

Under this formula, the ultimate goal of a good manager is to create a workplace environment in which employees would answer “strongly agree” to the following question: “At work do you have the opportunity to do what you do best every day?”

A job interview for a company operating under the “strengths revolution” principles would look and sound completely contrary to the one I witnessed.

Here’s what I imagine or fantasize:

Manager/Interviewer: “So you wrote in your statement of purpose on the application that you applied to work here because you believe in the idea of healthy, locally grown food, and you want to be part of an organization that makes these values central to its business.”

Applicant: “Yeah, I embrace those values and always have. It’s not just something for the application. I believe in the mission.”

Manager: “And I see you have done a fair amount of community service while in college and even in high school. It seems like you have strong ideals.”

Applicant: “Yeah, I know some students just do it to look good on the resume, but for me it’s not like that. I want to be useful in society and I have a lot to give.”

Manager: “OK, so how could you invest that energy as chief buyer for the cheese department?”

You get the point. Here is a job application process that sounds like a dialogue between people sharing information and exploring strengths and values, rather than a one-sided interrogation searching for deficits to uncover.

When you go out in the world, search for organizations and companies that subscribe to the “strengths revolution” model, and there you will find a workplace that will give you the chance to: “do what you do best every day?”

Jonathan Goldin is a licensed independent clinical social worker who specializes in coaching young men and women about careers and relationships, and has a practice in Amherst. He’s moderating a panel discussion in conjunction with the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce called “Getting Launched” Monday at 6 p.m. in room 106 of the Isenberg School of Management. He can be reached at [email protected] and 413-222-3006.